Category: Working with difficult moments

Some instructions for working with inner fears

Karl Duffy1 Comment

Our lives are not just on the surface; their greater part is concealed from casual observation. If we would like our obscure fears come into the open and dissolve, the conscious mind must be somewhat still, not everlastingly occupied; then, as the fears come to the surface, they must be observed without let or hindrance, for any form of condemnation or justification only strengthens fear. To be free from all fear, we must be awake to its darkening influence,a and only constant watchfulness can reveal its many causes.

Krishnamurti, Education and the Significance of Life

What helps us grow

Karl Duffy1 Comment

How strange that the nature of life is change, yet the nature of human beings is to resist change.

And how ironic that the difficult times we fear might ruin us,

are the very ones that can break us open and help us blossom into who we were meant to be.

Elisabeth Lesser, Broken Open

Dealing with difficulties as arising and falling away.

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Some people say that suffering is a fixed part of the mind, that it has been there forever. I try to explain that suffering is not intrinsic to the mind. It arises in the present moment. You have a mood of aversion in the mind and you experience suffering now. Think about a lemon. If you leave it alone is it sour? Where is the sourness then? It’s when the lemon contacts the tongue that sourness occurs. If you aren’t experiencing it, it’s as if it isn’t there. When there is contact with the tongue it arises at that moment. And from there arise dislike and afflictions. These afflictions are not intrinsic to the mind, but are momentary arisings.

Ajahn Chah, Being Dharma

Working with the stuck situations in our lives

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How do I communicate to the heart so that a stuck situation can ventilate? How do I communicate so that things that seem frozen, unworkable, and eternally aggressive begin to soften up, and some kind of compassionate exchange begins to happen?  It starts with being willing to have a compassionate relationship with the parts of ourselves that we feel are not worthy of existing on the planet. If we are willing through meditation to be mindful not only of what feels comfortable, but also of what pain feels like, if we even aspire to stay awake and open to what we’re feeling, to recognize and acknowledge it as best we can in each moment, then something begins to change.

Pema Chodron

Our troubles teach us compassion

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Everyone alive has suffered. It is the wisdom gained from our wounds and from our own experiences of suffering that makes us able to heal. Becoming expert has turned out to be less important than remembering and trusting the wholeness in myself and everyone else. Expertise cures, but wounded people can best be healed by other wounded people. Only other wounded people can understand what is needed, for the healing of suffering is compassion, not expertise.

Rachel Naomi Remen

Teens Day 16: Staying with difficult feelings

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It is absolutely fundamental that we learn, that when difficult situations and feelings arise, they are not obstacles to be avoided, but rather these very difficulties are, in fact, the path itself

Ezra Bayda